A Polluted World
by Bjrn Fallqvist
Summary: A story about life in the wasteland
1. Default Chapter

The room was dark, and the only light emitting was from the computer console´s green digits on his left side.  
  
Suddenly, a faint humming sound began and light´s which had not been used for decades, flared to life, bathing the now fully lit room in their blue- like glow, spreading over the smooth concrete walls, the few cables hanging loosely from the almost as smooth roof, indicating at least some connection with what was behind the security door just shut.  
  
A chittering noise began flowing in the dank air from the computer console, as it went through commands not used since the construction was built, flowing too fast for human eyes to read.  
  
When all security commands had been surpassed, the single light bulb in the room lighted up, igniting the room in a reddish light, while a warning alarm went off, indicating danger, probably from what was outside.  
  
There was a resounding creak in the area where he was standing, filling his ears, his very bones, with dread, as the roundedly shaped door before him slowly slid to the side, revealing noting but darkness and some rough mountain walls at each side, with stalactites hanging, trying to meet up with almost as high stalagmites emerging from the floor, giving the whole scene a grotesque look.  
  
With determined, but heavy steps, he stepped out of the hole of what had once been his home, and tried to more closely survey the area around him, but not much could be seen in the gloom, except a pile of bones just outside, making him recoil, before he could determine that the cause probably, and hopefully was, that he had not been able to make it inside before The Day.  
  
As he turned around, trying to peer deeper into the gloom, which seemed to be darkening before his very eyes, he heard some very disturbing noises emitting from the caverns, indicating that at least something was near.  
  
The heavy door numbered "13" by carving , rolled back in place with the help of the heavy axle, fastened with a pole in the complicated machinations built in the mountain, leaving him alone in the darkness with only the quickly-fading sound of the rumble emitted from the heavy Vault door when it slid in place. 


	2. Revelations

Carefully checking his possessions, which consisted of nothing but his Blue- and Yellow suit, which had been the standard way of clothing from where he had just emerged, a small pistol, a small computer from the pre-war time, where he could insert important information, which would be able to help him, some ammunition, along with some medical equipment, mainly consisting of an injection syringe with a healing drug (which was most often referred to as "stimpack", due to its ability to stimulate the users body-system to heal faster, but one drawback was the aftereffects, where the aforementioned user would become heavily fatigued and might experience some lesser dizziness).  
  
Once again surveying his surroundings, he noticed with irritation that he could not see more than just a few meters ahead of him, making him even more so jumpy, and at times he nearly jumped out of his own skin because of the shadows the sometimes strangely angled parts of the rough cavern walls around.  
  
He did not really know in which direction he was supposed to be going. All he had to go after was a roughly, hastily drawn map, which had to have been dug up from the pre-war times, back at the times when the vaults were constructed, in the old archives, and he was not very sure as to whether or not the surroundings had changed.  
  
So he picked a random direction, and started moving into one of the caverns on his right side, but had not come far, before he found himself being attacked by something which was about the size of his leg, and before he could react, he felt a stinging pain in his right calf.  
  
He quickly kicked away, but the substance clinging to the leg wouldn't give away, and his only option was to try and remove it by sheer force.  
  
Clenching his teeth and stretching down, he caught a handful of fur, which he savagely ripped away, and at this he heard a yelp as the form was torn away, and flung into a wall, where it crashed into the wall with a sickening crunch, and slid down to the floor slowly, dead.  
  
His leg aching, he stumbled forward, to try to examine what it had been closer, and he was terrified, not to say surprised, to see it had been a rat, its red eyes now staring at nothing, the jaw slightly open to reveal sharp teeth, and its backbone broken.  
  
Animals was not supposed to be this big, at least according to the vault archives, which he had taken a good look into before his departure.  
  
If this had happened to rats, then how would other things in the world as he knew it, have changed?  
  
Using one of the small bandages he had brought along, he quickly wrapped it around the wound at the calf, and hoped it would not slow him too much.  
  
Exiting the small cavern back to the "main" passage, he much more carefully executed his route now, and several times being close to passing right into lairs of the small beasts, but fortunately, most of the rats did not scent or see him, probably because of their own smell, he thought, a bit amused.  
  
By now, he had a vague direction as to where he was going, and after a while he had also learned to recognize the side-caverns which were nothing more than lairs, mostly by the build of them, since they seemed to be more roughly cut out, and might have occurred due to natural causes, instead of the main passage, which seemed to be much more cut out in the mountain, almost as a road.  
  
Wandering for hours, constantly on his watch against whatever could hide in the shadows, he was growing even more tired, but luckily, his leg was not aching as much anymore, now whether this was a bad thing or not, he did not know.  
  
He had started to near exhaustion, when he thought he smelled something in the dank air. Something that smelled cleaner, or perhaps more fresh, but it was, however tinged with something that could only be described as "stuffy", as when something is very hot, like it had been when they had had problems with the air-conditioners back in the Vault.  
  
Quickly pushing away the thoughts of his friends and what was behind, the quickened up his pace, and noticed that almost any side-passages were absent now.  
  
He hardly got any warning at all, so sharp was the turn. All the time he had been underground, his eyes had become very sensitive, and when he rounded the sharp-cut corner, he was hit fully by the light of the outside, and became afraid he had been blinded when the sight did not return for fully a few minutes.  
  
When he could once again see, what he saw filled him with awe, Up above him, the roof of the cavern had opened up for at least fully 5 meters, and also, the passage had widened to at least five meters to each side, leaving him in the middle of the opening, and this was indeed an opening.  
  
An opening, from where the outer world could enter the relative safety. It could probably be well described as a staging area, since all around him, strange machines and vehicles, all covered by a layer of dust and sand.  
  
His clinical part of the mind figured this had to be from where they had transported everything deeper, and there were even some carts and crates, both shattered and unharmed, scattered around on the sand-covered concrete floor.  
  
But he himself was not aware of any of this, since he kept gazing upon the outer world, the outside world he had heard so much about. He could see nothing but sand, sand as far as the eye could see, and some desert weed in places, and by now he found himself lucky he had been only temporarily blinded by the light, since he now saw the light as it was. Dusk was setting over the wasteland. 


	3. Discoveries of an Unknown World

He settled for a rest in the opening in the mountain, unable to keep standing any longer, and simply slumped against a big black rubber tire lying by one of the walls, and drifted off to sleep very soon, where he could sort out his life.  
  
--------------------------------------  
  
Dave had been born 22 years ago, and all life ha had known had been that of a vaultdweller and the only "world" he had known was that of the three levels the vault consisted of.  
  
He had been raised to life in the vault, and to just keep doing the chores of everyday life, which mainly included keeping out of the adults way, when they were working (although there had not been much work to be done there, except repairing some systems, checking everything worked all right, and so on) and much of the free time he had spent with his friends, often just talking about what they knew as "the outside", fantasising about what it was like there, and how it had been before The War, which they heard so much about.  
  
It had been quite a boring life, and he had not exactly been one to just sit around when there were things to be done. People around him had always referred to him as a "walking energy pack", and whenever something had to be fetched, or when he was bored (and hid anything he could find just to watch the tumult which then occurred), he was always nearby.  
  
As an grown-up, he had also carried this energy with him, and was always busy with something, whatever it could be.  
  
By his childhood, he had only known life as simple, and never thought of what actually made them available to keep living like that, and that was where the latest part of his life, and also the darker one, which would give him nightmares for many years ahead (and even now it pressed on his mind, always there at the edge of whatever he thought of, like an annoying bug you just can't get rid of), began.  
  
A week ago, the Overseer, an elderly man in his sixties whom Dave always had liked, with a kind face (this time deeply furrowed with concern), had gathered everyone at a certain age, which was those who still was quite young and healthy in his room, and explained to them something which filled them all with a feeling of despair and something on the brink of panic.  
  
One of the most essential things the constructors of these vaults had to have thought of was how to make the population survive, and in doing this they had constructed several machines, which enabled them to recycle their water, grow new food in the special plantations, and transform their waste into things of the biological.  
  
There is no need to explain how important all this is to a vault and that is why fear was clearly etched in every face as the vault overseer explained the dire situation.  
  
The overseer had taken a deep breath and then began  
  
"Ahh, you're here. Good. That is good. You see, we have a problem. A big one" "The water chip for our water purification system has given up the ghost".  
  
At this, some people in the room had paled some other recoiled in shock, and some just staring dumbly, before what that meant actually had gotten in their heads.  
  
"B.But can't we make another one?" one of the youngest, Cathy, a short always-smiling 18-year old girl with her red hair put in a ponytail, her blue eyes pleading now slung over her shoulder, managed to stammer, before anyone else could manage to get a word off their tongues.  
  
"No, we don't have the necessary parts, neither do we have the technology" the Overseer replied, his face a mask of hidden concern, as this probably was terrifying him as much as everyone else.  
  
"And we can't make a work around system either, it's simply too complicated", he said, worriedly scratching his beard as he drummed his fingers on the side of the Overseer's chair (which was a three meter tall "chair", which can be best described as a small tower, with a place for the overseer to sit, where he can oversee anything going on in the vault) managing to stoke any further suggestions to solutions he had already examined (and to his disappointment, found fruitless)  
  
He looked them all in the eye, and the next words were barely more than a whisper, but still, it echoed against the walls of the big control room  
  
"We need one of you to leave, and we must find another chip, otherwise." he trailed off, before managing the next sentence "Otherwise this vault is doomed. Simply put, we are running out of drinking water, and we have roughly four or five months left."  
  
The only sound was not the constant buzzing of the computer consoles placed against the walls, making calculations and generally controlling everything electronic in the complex.  
  
"But.who?" a tall man with a blonde short hair and beard asked. Dave couldn't remember who he was, at that time, but there was certainly something he did not like about the man.  
  
"I wish I would never have had to do this, but it is something that must be done, and hopefully, it will be done voluntarily."  
  
"Wouldn't we have a bigger chance to survive if we sent out more than one?" Cathy asked again, now having regained most of the control of her voice.  
  
"We can't. We simply need almost everyone to try work on finding a different solution, or." the Overseer hesitated before continuing "Or helping everyone here if we would have to leave."  
  
Dave had looked around at the other twenty or so people in the room, seeing nothing but despair.  
  
Almost all of them had some reason to stay, and a lot of them were couples, with their own children, and for the others who weren't, they were simply too young. He had lived a very hectic a life, and had not yet even began to envision considering a relationship.  
  
He made his decision then and there, before he would regret it.  
  
"I'll go" he had said, stunning everyone in the room as intently watched him as to make sure they had heard him correctly.  
  
As if he wanted to assure them, he repeated, but more like a whisper this time "I'll go".  
  
--------------------------------------  
  
Dave awoke with a shock; the first thing noticing was the intense heat, as he saw the sun was high in the sky. And it was hot, so awfully hot, he could scarcely believe it, and he was feeling trickles of sweat running down his neck, into the synthetic suit he wore.  
  
He heaved himself to a standing position, using the rubber tire to leverage himself, and then quickly jerked the hand away as it felt as though it was burned instantly.  
  
Gathering his courage, he left the opening in the mountain, to his home, and wandered off into the direction the Vault Overseer had given him, and had programmed in his PIP-computer (Personal Information Processor, an old dusty and scratched personal computer, but which had been the only one available, and it could still hold data files, and record information).  
  
He wandered for hours, trying to ignore the sweat soaking his suit, and occasionally stopped to re-check this position, or drink from one of his water flasks he had been allowed to bring along.  
  
There was nothing but sand, and from time to time, some log or weed sticking up from the dunes. At times he even saw some rusty kinds of metal- heaps, with rounded places for something at four places (supposedly rubber tires), and these he supposed would be the "cars" the archives had spoken about, and they had actually been a bit of one part of what started the war. The most harmful thing now about them would probably be the green desert- salamanders, who were all misshaped in some way, who intently watched him as he passed by, but made no move, only kept to watch him.  
  
After a few hours in this desolate landscape, he felt a change in the air. It suddenly felt as if it was not the dank desert air anymore, but more the kind of air that was produced by a fan (but still very hot). He had hardly been able to finish his line of thought before he was hit by a gust of wind, which increased to a roar in his ears, spitting sand in his face, in his mouth, in his nostrils, making sand get stuck to the sweat on his back, and as he tried to cover his face, it hit the arm and the skin of his hand with such a force it felt as if it was slowly tearing the skin off, bit by bit.  
  
For minutes, he could not see anything, and he just stumbled on, until he felt something with his hand. A smooth surface, not such as stone, but this was more finely cut than stone, or perhaps, he figured, it was the sand storms that had shaped it as such.  
  
He tried to follow the surface, and tripped and fell face first in the sand, his mouth being refilled of the small particles, and as he tried to spit it out, even more came into his mouth, threatening to choke him.  
  
He managed to get himself into a standing position once again by grabbing a hold in the wall to his right, and to his surprise as he continued to drag himself further, he felt there was an edge.  
  
He swung himself around the edge with the last of his reservoir energy, and all around him, the wind went still. Or he could still hear it, but he could not feel it, or any of the sand it brought along.  
  
When he had spent a minute or so at spitting up sand from his almost choked throat, clearing it away from his nostrils and eyes, and making sure there was no permanent damage on his hands, he looked around.  
  
He was surrounded by four walls, who probably once had been white or such, but now was a dull grey coloured black and brown, by rust, and they all also appeared to have been badly burnt.  
  
The door had been blasted off its hinges, and was lying in small room in the opposite corner as to where he was, battered, and hardly good for anything more than splinters now.  
  
What had him most surprised was that the roof was almost intact, and even if he could not see what material it was, due to the gloom and the fact that it was badly burnt, but it seemed as quite solid. There were only some small holes in it, where small grains of sand slowly seeped in, putting themselves in small organized piles on the floor, where a broken chair of now rotten wood and some other unidentifiable objects lay.  
  
Dave picked up what was left of the door, and ignored the fact that it was almost split apart in three pieces. It was still solid material, and had fared a bit better than the other wood in the room, since it was built with a metal frame.  
  
With this in thought, he put it as well as he could in front of the door opening, leaning it a bit against the site, to make sure it would not simply fall out, before he went back to a corner of the room.  
  
As the sandstorm outside continued to howl, and the world all around him seemed to be in disintegration, Dave once again fell into a blissful sleep, in a world he knew practically nothing about. 


	4. First apporach

Chapter 4 - Civilization  
  
After the storm had settled to nothing but a faint hum in the air, Dave lifted away the sturdy door, and peered outside. Instantly, he became aware of the ever-present sun, and the moment he stepped outside he actually noticed where he was.  
  
Around him, there were small parts of walls still standing in the sand, most not higher than his knee, having been blasted away by some force he could not comprehend, but a few were left standing, and among those the small space he had found shelter.  
  
All around him, there were blackened fragments sticking out of the sand, and it did not take long for him to figure out that this probably once had been a village, a small city of some kind.  
  
Gathering up his belongings, he set out again, picking his way between the rubble, passing a quite big building, it's roof fallen in and the edges of it badly burn. One of the short sides had given in, and had fallen in. A broad stairway now scorched and broken, led up to the entry, where an empty doorway and equally empty, blackened windows with no pans, but only the frames left, staring down below at the sand, constantly blowing up on the stairway, only to be swept down by another gust of wind a few seconds later, an endless cycle.  
  
Passing by it, he held his steps for a few seconds or so, intently watching a mark of what once had been a highly developed civilization, before continuing on his path by it, stepping over a fallen pole with a sign that stated "stop" upon it.  
  
Behind him, the ruin's empty windows continued to stare off into the seemingly endless dunes of the desert, and only by it could you see a sign that this had been a great city long ago, and on the rubble-covered floor, a piece of the upper roof had fallen down, remarkably in one piece, but not yet so scorched by the sand that it was unreadable to see what it was, an eagle upon a round background with the words "United States of America" around it.  
  
When the ruins were hardly anything more than a spot behind him, Dave thought he could see something ahead, something that actually looked like a settlement.  
  
When he approached it, he could clearly see what it was, and it indeed looked as a settlement.  
  
Because of his vantage point, where he was standing upon a dune, he could easily survey the area, and A two or three meter tall wall built of white stone surrounded the whole area, and inside it were houses, most small, but a few bigger, all made out of the same white stones, with scarcely placed windows , probably to keep the heat out he mused, and those who were in place were rounded, with wooden bars crossed over them.  
  
It could not have been a big settlement, probably nothing more than a few hundred yards wide and at the very most a hundred yards long.  
  
Between many of the houses, he saw crops being sowed, and there was also a Brahmin pen in the north-western corner by the wall. He could feel the smell all the way where he was now standing, at the gates, because he had now arrived by it, an interruption in the constant white wall, with a stoned arch over it, which showed a "road", or more like a "place where there were no houses", or "free path", or whatever one may wish to call it, down to the opposite wall.  
  
He could make out a stone pillar in the middle of it, about halfway down, and there was one bigger house to the left by the wall in the south.  
  
As of now, however, he was more intent on watching the people he saw at the gate, one who carried some kind of aged rifle, probably rebuilt for hunting or the such, but who had a friendly, but yet at the same time stern face. He was dressed in the usual clothes of a farmer, which consisted of deep brown boots, which looked much worn, probably made out of Brahmin hide, yellow tunics, and a brown tunic. He had brown hair, but which was greying at the edges, and he frowned as he saw Dave approach.  
  
By his side was also a woman, probably not much older than Dave himself, dressed in similar clothes to that of the man, but instead of the constant frown, she wore a smile, and did not at all seem very troubled at having visitors. She had blonde shoulder-length hair, and she actually seemed to brighten up on the prospect of him approaching, as if she simply was too bored by being where she was now.  
  
Deciding to simply take a direct approach, he picked up his pace in their direction, and tried to ignore the small tremble that ran through the older man's trigger finger, and prepared himself to try to keep as diplomatic as it was possible. 


	5. New Hopes

"Hold it there, and holster that weapon. We don't like strangers waving them around here." The man was still holding his finger on the rifle trigger, but thankfully he did not seem very nervous, as that would almost surely have meant trouble.  
  
"Alright, don't worry, I'm not looking for any trouble" Dave said, when putting his pistol, which he had had hanging around his side, away.  
  
The man's stance eased a little bit, and some of the tension surrounding them went away.  
  
"Sorry about the rude welcome, stranger, but we have had quite the lot of raider troubles lately."  
  
"Raiders?"  
  
Seeing the puzzled look on his face, the man curiously said "Yeah, didn't you know? They've been acting a lot more violently lately, and it seems a particular large group have decided to settle down a few days travel south of here. They've been giving us all the trouble we can handle.  
  
Suppose I can't blame you for not knowing.you look a bit out of place here, if you don't mind me saying that" he said, glancing at the blue-and yellow vault suit.  
  
"You could.say that, yes. I am Dave" Dave said and extended his hand and they grasped hands.  
  
"I am known as Seth around here, and this is the village of Shady Sands. Not much around here, we're basically just a farming village."  
  
"So I saw.tell me, this may sound a bit weird, but you don't happen to know anything about large constructions, known as vaults? They were built in the pre-war time."  
  
As Seth scratched some stubble on his face, and tried to think of something, the woman who had been standing idly at his side during the whole time, interjected  
  
"I might do."  
  
Seeing both their eyes turning to her, she added "Well, I grew up in one of those things."  
  
Dave's interest immediately perched up, and she continued "What was it called again.Oh yes, Vault 15. We had to abandon it some 10 or 15 years ago. I don't remember much, only that something essential no longer was functional, and so we headed to the surface. From there, each groups went their different paths, for me and my family, we found this place, and have been living here ever since." She concluded with a smile.  
  
"I forgot to introduce her, this is Katrine. And yes, as she says, she arrived a number of years ago, with some a story like that."  
  
"Thank you, but do you remember where this vault was?"  
  
"No, not exactly. Hey, tell me somebody who remembers anything while still just a small child!" She added when seeing his slightly annoyed expression.  
  
"I'm sorry, it's just that I am kind of.hard pressed to find one of these vaults." He added with a small smile of his own. "But do you remember in what area it was?"  
  
"Perhaps, but I'm not sure." She said, shook her blonde locks out of the face, and explained the where about vaguely, and to Dave's excitement, and joy, it seemed as though it was in the direction the Overseer hat put him in.  
  
"Thanks. You have no idea how much this means to me." He said, and was just thinking of leaving again, when Seth addressed him.  
  
"Before you go.do you think you can speak with our leader, Aradesh? He might know something you may have a use of, and besides, there is a small problem that we can not handle on our own, and would be grateful for any help".  
  
He was pressed with time, but the situation was not yet critical, so he agreed, and set down the fields of Shady Sands, with his intent focused on the village leader's house, and wondered what this might mean to him. 


End file.
